Thursday’s squeaker of a Senate vote on the Keystone XL pipeline serves both as a warning to President Barack Obama that a majority of both houses of Congress supports the pipeline and as encouragement to Republicans to keep pushing the issue.
Obama had personally lobbied Senate Democrats with phone calls urging them to oppose an amendment to the highway bill that would fast-track the Canada-to-Texas oil pipeline. And as it turned out, he needed every bit of their help.
In all, 11 Democrats joined 45 Republicans to support the pipeline. Only the fact that 60 votes were needed for passage saved the White House from an embarrassing defeat.
Sen. Dick Lugar (R-Ind.) wryly congratulated Obama on his lobbying efforts.
“That was very strong work by President Obama himself, making personal calls to Democrats,” Lugar said. “He understood that a majority of the American public and a majority at least of the Senate are strongly in favor of this project.
“So I suppose you give credit to the president for once again blocking something, but I don’t think the president really wants to do that indefinitely,” he added.
“We got a majority in the Senate,” said amendment sponsor Sen. John Hoeven (R-N.D.), who noted that two senators — Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) and John Thune (R-S.D.) — were absent. “So we would have had 58 votes had all Republicans been able to be here.”
Republicans promised that the issue, which has been a staple of the campaign trail since Obama first attempted in November to punt the decision until 2013, will not go away.
“We’re very close to the 60,” Hoeven said. “It’s hard to say exactly which members maybe would have supported without White House intervention, but I think the important thing is that the support is there, and the support is there because the public wants this to happen.
“The pressure is just going to increase on the administration to get this project done,” Hoeven added.
The 11 Democrats who crossed party lines to support the amendment were Max Baucus of Montana, Mark Begich of Alaska, Bob Casey of Pennsylvania, Kent Conrad of North Dakota, Kay Hagan of North Carolina, Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Joe Manchin of West Virginia, Claire McCaskill of Missouri, Mark Pryor of Arkansas, Jon Tester of Montana and Jim Webb of Virginia.
Landrieu said she was not among those getting a call from Obama. And she was not surprised to see 10 Democrats join with her to cross party lines.
